REDWOOD CITY, Calif., October 12, 2010: The Cleantech Open — the world’s largest business competition devoted to finding, funding, and fostering successful cleantech businesses — has announced the six finalists who will represent the region at the national competition in November. These winning teams—Fogbusters, Pressure Sentinel, Pure Solar, SmartSense, Stramit Strawboard, and Suntulit—were selected from an elite group of 37 semifinalist cleantech entrepreneur teams that competed in the California competition.

In addition to the six regional winners, Bellwether Materials won the regional sustainability award, an honor given to the team that most effectively incorporated a triple-bottom-line approach to scaling its business.

“Making it through to the finals is a huge step for these teams, who are already winners among the many teams that entered the California competition,” said Rex Northen, executive director of the Cleantech Open. “These California finalists will convene next month with teams from our four other regions at the Cleantech Open National Awards and Expo, our annual showcase of the best in global cleantech.”

In March of this year, 271 teams across five regions submitted entries—the most ever in the five-year history of the competition. 81 of those teams made it through to the semifinals, of which 37 were California semifinalists. Last week, at Chevron headquarters in San Ramon, each California semifinalist team presented its business plan to the Cleantech Open judges, who selected six to compete in the national competition.

Each finalist team won a “Startup in a Box” prize package including combined cash and in-kind services worth up to $30,000. Finalists from all five regions (California, North Central, Northeast, Pacific Northwest and Rocky Mountain) will convene for a final showdown at the Cleantech Open National Awards and Expo, held in San Jose on November 17.

Open competition offers more than $1 million in total prizes and aims to create 100,000 green-collar jobs in America by the end of 2015 with its “100K Jobs Challenge.” Currently, 22 states participate in the Cleantech Open program, and over 30 states are expected to contribute companies to the program in 2011.